University of Edinburgh students at the Venice Biennale

Students from Scottish art colleges talk about working with Edinburgh College of Art graduate, Rachel Maclean, at the Venice Biennale.

Transcript

It's amazing to be here and it's such a privilege. I came here just after I graduated for the first time for the Biennale in 2009. That was great - very different - I stayed on a campsite on the mainland and, it was an amazing experience just to encounter so many artists' work, it's kind of overwhelming, but really informative.

Yeh, it's really amazing to be back here and showing work, and actually [being] part of the Biennale. Venice as a place is incredibly inspiring, I find it very eye-opening, just in terms of what goes on in terms of working on an exhibition, especially in such an international context - we'll be invigilating

the space, making sure everyone's welcome to Scotland and Venice, because of course they are.

All the behind-the-scenes things, it's very valuable to see, especially going into my final year - working towards degree show. Working with Rachel has been really fun, she's a really great person to work with, she's really excited about being in Venice - and us too, we're just getting started as well with our careers, getting to know her work and learning more about video and learning more about installation, especially in such a complicated space - this deconsecrated church - a really good inspiration for us as well to kind of, think about the future of our own work and also think about future careers working in curation or working in international art fairs as well.

Well the fact of just basically being here surrounded by artists and art professionals from all around the world who come to the space, just gets us invaluable contacts with people from all around the world, from all different backgrounds -the reach of the project and the benefits of the project go beyond simply what happens in Venice and actually has a lasting and positive benefit across Scotland on its return.

Working here at the Biennale has been amazing so far, being here for a full month is a great opportunity. The development programme's fantastic and the students I have met who are part of it are really brilliant and have done such an amazing job. I am so excited for them - I'm looking forward to seeing what they make and what they do as a result of the experience. I think there'll be an amazing legacy of that for Scotland and for the Scottish arts scene.

This article was published on Nov 7, 2017

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